Did anyone run out of gas yet!

[utkan]

I want to know what happens when TCH runs out of gas. Does it still run on electric till battery runs out or just shut off?



I am willing to try it out with backup gas in the trunk if no one tryed it yet.

[haroldo]

Aside from possibly burning out your fuel pump, I dont see any other benefit in running out of gas.
Clearly it wont bring bragging rights nor the respect of one's peers.
As far as the battery is concerned, there is nothing special about the car running out of gas, since the car frequently drives with the engine off.
The battery will continue powering the car running (at speeds under 40 MPH and without the need for heavy acceleration) until it needs to be recharged.
Without gas, presumably it will shut down.
I haven't come across anyone in the forums foolish enough to try this stunt, so I can't say for sure what will happen, however.

[mustang67408]

If you run this vehicle out of fuel , you will have approximately 3-5 minutes of electrical run time before the ecu shuts the vehicle down completely(HV battery will be depleted). When this occurs the HV battery will then need to be charged with a special battery charger ($35K) that only Toyota has and there are only 5 in the U.S.
I recommend not running this vehicle out of fuel and not to experiment, it could get expensive.
I have had to repair 2 HV camry's that ran out of fuel.

[utkan]

Originally Posted by haroldo

Aside from possibly burning out your fuel pump, I dont see any other benefit in running out of gas.
Clearly it wont bring bragging rights nor the respect of one's peers.
As far as the battery is concerned, there is nothing special about the car running out of gas, since the car frequently drives with the engine off.
The battery will continue powering the car running (at speeds under 40 MPH and without the need for heavy acceleration) until it needs to be recharged.
Without gas, presumably it will shut down.
I haven't come across anyone in the forums foolish enough to try this stunt, so I can't say for sure what will happen, however.

WTF man what is your problem. Who said that i am trying to have bragging rights? And where did you come out with burning your fuel pump BS...
All I wanted to know what might happen (or did ..) if this happens.
mustang67408 thanks for USEFULL info.
One question to you (not haroldo) , my wife drain the battery once (leaving the car on but not on raedy) and giving a jump to the 12v battery fix the problem. Is that the same kind of draining the battery?

And it is kind of messed up for toyota to not let us know about this big problem we might couse. When I was 20 i run out of gas all the time..

[mustang67408]

Without a "READY LIGHT" The vehicle will not move and the HV system is not really powered up, so it should not drain the main HV battery to much, it will drain the CAR battery because the HV system is not READY and no charging can occur. Drivng in "READY position makes all the HV components ACTIVE and they can drain the HV battery if the engine doesnt run.
I would nt worry to much, just be aware, running out of fuel is bad.....but I know it happens.

[haroldo]

Originally Posted by utkan

...Who said that i am trying to have bragging rights?

Pardon, me, I must have misinterpreted the following line...

Originally Posted by utkan

...I am willing to try it out with backup gas in the trunk if no one tryed it yet.

My mistake!


---

Originally Posted by utkan

... And where did you come out with burning your fuel pump BS...

Three separate auto mechanics, five different senior forum member posts and 209,000 (at last count) separate Google results, including this one

...

But, hey, I (and a few hundred thousand others) could be wrong.

[mustang67408]

YES, it could burn out a fuel pump, but TOYOTA fuel pumps are rather tough. I personnally have only seen a couple of fuel pumps "die" directly relating to running out of fuel in the last 25 years, on TOYOTAS.

So, yes it is possible, but not likely. IMO. The vehicle will shout down shortly after running out of fuel and you will eventually have to have it towed. By the time you run out of fuel and it shuts down completely and you turn it off, the fuel pump SHOULD still be ok, but it Could die as a result. ......not worth the gamble to me.
Keep the tank over 1/4 and you should never have an issue and it will keep you and the oil companies happy.

[Dianne]

OK. I will admit it.
I have run my Prius dry. More than once. Matter of fact, I have done this in both Prius I have had - my 2005 and my 2007. I have done it at least three times in my 2007 in the last year. Never mind why - I get forgetful and busy in my head or on the cel phone and OOOPS! Once, I seriously thought I had enough to make it to the work exit and get gas but that's why in Prius, it's often called a GUESS Gauge and not a gas gauge.

What happens is... the car MOTOR dies and you can feel the deceleration immediately. The car can run on the battery/electric but not at a speed that's high -- maybe 40 mph max. And, depending on how high the battery charge level was when she ran out, that can also go fast! I had never needed a special charge off any special battery... I just added gas and the big red or yellow warning triangle vanished and it was biz as usual.

Dianne

[Dianne]

OK. I will admit it.
I have run my Prius dry. More than once. Matter of fact, I have done this in both Prius I have had - my 2005 and my 2007. I have done it at least three times in my 2007 in the last year. Never mind why - I get forgetful and busy in my head or on the cel phone and OOOPS! Once, I seriously thought I had enough to make it to the work exit and get gas but that's why in Prius, it's often called a GUESS Gauge and not a gas gauge.

What happens is... the car MOTOR dies and you can feel the deceleration immediately. The car can run on the battery/electric but not at a speed that's high -- maybe 40 mph max. And, depending on how high the battery charge level was when she ran out, that can also go fast! I had never needed a special charge off any special battery... I just added gas and the big red or yellow warning triangle vanished and it was biz as usual.

Dianne

[haroldo]

Not sure about the Prius, but the Camry has a good low fuel indicator. It lights up with plenty of gas left in the tank. It's bright, easy to see and gets the job done.
However, I have installed a secondary indicator that guarantees that I will never, ever run out of gas...it's called a wife and kids. As soon as the light illuminates, one, two or all three of them, at intermittent times yells out "let's stop for gas".
The longer you drive with the yellow light on, the more frequent and loud their warnings become.
I've yet to make it 4 miles with the light on.

[mustang67408]

Originally Posted by Dianne

OK. I will admit it.
I have run my Prius dry. More than once. Matter of fact, I have done this in both Prius I have had - my 2005 and my 2007. I have done it at least three times in my 2007 in the last year. Never mind why - I get forgetful and busy in my head or on the cel phone and OOOPS! Once, I seriously thought I had enough to make it to the work exit and get gas but that's why in Prius, it's often called a GUESS Gauge and not a gas gauge.

What happens is... the car MOTOR dies and you can feel the deceleration immediately. The car can run on the battery/electric but not at a speed that's high -- maybe 40 mph max. And, depending on how high the battery charge level was when she ran out, that can also go fast! I had never needed a special charge off any special battery... I just added gas and the big red or yellow warning triangle vanished and it was biz as usual.

Dianne

Your lucky.
We have only had to "CHARGE 2 Camry's" that ran out of fuel, as they were driven to Depletion on the HV battery. The 3rd one was filled with DIESEL and driven until it died and then towed in, that also depleted the HV battery.
They do set check engine and Master warning lights as you said and Specific CODES for running out of fuel. The fuel helps keep the pump cool, so running out of fuel is excessive wear and tear on it and not a real good idea, but I know it happens...my wife did the same thing in her mustang a few years ago..

[currybob]

Very good info here.

Thanks to all.

Bob

[ag4ever]

Originally Posted by Dianne

OK. I will admit it.
I have run my Prius dry. More than once. Matter of fact, I have done this in both Prius I have had - my 2005 and my 2007. I have done it at least three times in my 2007 in the last year. Never mind why - I get forgetful and busy in my head or on the cel phone and OOOPS! Once, I seriously thought I had enough to make it to the work exit and get gas but that's why in Prius, it's often called a GUESS Gauge and not a gas gauge.

What happens is... the car MOTOR dies and you can feel the deceleration immediately. The car can run on the battery/electric but not at a speed that's high -- maybe 40 mph max. And, depending on how high the battery charge level was when she ran out, that can also go fast! I had never needed a special charge off any special battery... I just added gas and the big red or yellow warning triangle vanished and it was biz as usual.

Dianne

This is exactly what happens when you run the Camry HV out of gas.

I did it once.

I can get 100 - 120 miles out of a tank of fuel past when the DTE shows 0. One time I foolishly tried to make it to my "cheap" gas station when I was 150 miles past the DTE reading 0. The engine died, I drove an additional 3 miles to the gas station. (I would be very worried going further than that on battery alone. I was watching my battery level and was planning to stop when it got down to one purple bar.) The station is right off the interstate, and I was traveling 70 at the time. The engine died, I lost a lot of speed at first, then it ran on the battery at 40 MPH untill I reached the fuel pump. There were a bunch of lights that came on, on the dash. Once I filled the tank the car ran like nothing ever happened. This was the only time I ever have seen my battery gauge show the purple bars on the nav screen.

I feel good knowing what happens when you run out of fuel, but don't plan to push it that far again. I will stick with the "fuel before 120 miles past 0 DTE" I had before I tried to risk it that one time.

[WVGasGuy]

Originally Posted by utkan

WTF man what is your problem. Who said that i am trying to have bragging rights? All I wanted to know what might happen (or did ..) if this happens.
And it is kind of messed up for toyota to not let us know about this big problem we might couse. When I was 20 i run out of gas all the time..

Hoping not to tick you off like the other responder, I will say a person has to try hard to run out of gas. It has to be intentional since the light will come on and you still have about 75 to 100 mile driving range. Toyota does indeed warn you not to drive without gas. Read the owners manual. They are so concerned about it that they tell you the tank is empty with almost 3 gallons left. I think that's overkill personally, but since there are people that may routeinly run out of gas they have built into this a huge factor of safety.

There were people in the early days that ran theirs empty to indeed have "bragging rights" as to how far they drove on a tank. They typically did it in a fairly controlled manner and had a gas station close once they started getting to their empty point. They simply wanted to know how much reserve was in the tank. Now that they "proved" it we can all feel comfortable driving to the "E" mark.

[ag4ever]

Originally Posted by WVGasGuy

Hoping not to tick you off like the other responder, I will say a person has to try hard to run out of gas. It has to be intentional since the light will come on and you still have about 75 to 100 mile driving range.

Actually, you have approximatly 100 to 120 miles left after the trip computer reads DTE 0. The gas light comes on with approximatly 50 miles left on the DTE. So, your comment should read, "It has to be intentional since the light will come on and you still have about a 150 to 175 mile driving range."

In my case it was because I DID want to know how far I could push it if I wanted to, and I routinly go 80 - 90 miles past the DTE 0 mark because I hate stopping to fill the tank. If I get an extra 100 miles per tank that means for every 5 tanks I can save one trip to the gas station saving a little bit of time. Since I have almost 80,000 miles on my car since getting it in October of 2006, I see the gas station way too much as it is. fortunatly I was able to cut my commute to work in half a year ago, but that will end in about 3 - 4 months when my current project is complete. Then I will be returning to my old commute of 120 miles per day, or 1.3 tanks per week when you figure in the weekend errand driving.

And if I do burn up a fuel pump, they are not that hard to replace. I have only known of one other fuel pump to fail, and that was in a '90 chrysler lebarron convertable. It failed at over 200,000 miles. That was my father's car and he tends to push the DTE range much like I do, so it might have lived a bit longer if he kept the tank over 1/4 full. But I doubt many will keep a car past 200,000 miles.

In the end, I don't recomend others pushing the range as far as I do, and really don't recomend running out of gas. But I am willing to take the risks as I live life on the edge.